Variable or compressed work week

When you compress your standard weekly hours into fewer than 5 standard working days over a given period, you work a variable workweek. Basically, you work more than 7.5 hours each day (if that’s your standard workday) with the goal of reducing the total number of days you work in a given period. This is more commonly known as a compressed workweek.

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Eligibility

Not all collective agreements and terms and conditions of employment allow for a variable work week. To determine if you are eligible to request a variable workweek, consult your relevant authorities.

Your request for a variable workweek requires the approval of your manager, who must consider operational requirements and costs, such as overtime, before approving. Once your manager has approved your variable work week schedule, they will advise your departmental human resources team, who in turn will provide the necessary information to the Pay Centre.

Your salary will remain the same during the approved period of the variable workweek.

Overtime

Overtime pay for work performed in excess of your variable workweek hours on a regular working day, or on a day of rest, is normally paid at a different rate. In many collective agreements, it is paid at time and three-quarters. Refer to the relevant authorities such as your collective agreement or the various terms and conditions of employment specific to your classification group.

Acting pay

If you are working a variable workweek, the qualifying period for acting pay will be converted to hours. For example, if your collective agreement states that the qualifying period to be eligible for acting pay is 3 days and the hours of work in your collective agreement are 7.5 hours per day, you must act for 22.5 hours before qualifying for acting pay.

Example: 7.5 hours x 3 days = 22.5 hours

The acting pay will be paid to you based on the number of hours you work per day. For example, if you work 8.33 hours per day for 5 days, the payment to you will be 8.33 hours per day x 5 days which would be equivalent to 41.65 hours.

Designated holidays

You must make up the difference in time or submit a vacation leave request for the additional time difference between any designated holiday hours and your compressed work day hours. Your collective agreement specifies what your designated holiday is worth (for example 7.5 or 8 hours). You must establish your make-up time in advance with your manager.

Requesting leave

When you request a day of leave, you must report the variable hours and not the regular standard hours of work defined in the collective agreement or terms and conditions of employment. For example, if your variable work day is 8.33 hours, you will request leave for 8.33 hours and not 7.5 hours.

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